


point of contact

by anna_bolinas



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Episode Fix-it: 2017 Xmas Twice Upon A Time, F/M, Spoilers for Episode: 2017 Xmas Twice Upon a Time, not a total fix-it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-14
Updated: 2019-02-14
Packaged: 2019-10-28 01:37:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17778140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anna_bolinas/pseuds/anna_bolinas
Summary: Well,he tells himself.I'll have to chance it too. The universe is too big a place to go making wild guesses. And the universe owes me this.





	point of contact

**Author's Note:**

> This isn’t meant to diss “Twice Upon a Time”, because that was basically the perfect send-off for Twelve. But I always feel sad thinking that Clara doesn’t know that the Doctor remembers her, and I figure that if the Doctor can find a loophole in the memory blocking, then I can find a loophole to let Clara know he got his memories back. And so, this was born. Please enjoy!
> 
> Credit for several lines of dialogue goes to Steven Moffat, primarily from his episodes "Hell Bent" and "Twice Upon a Time".

You never know how much you’ve missed something until you fully realize you’ve been missing it. Or something like that. His brain is fizzling with regeneration energy. He’s not at his most eloquent.

He feels Bill press a kiss against his cheek, then step back. He blinks. And in that millisecond between his eyes closing and opening, something shifts in his mind.

She’s standing in front of him, in the same clothes as the last time he saw her--but no, it wasn’t the last time. It was the second to last time. Because in between then and now, he had seen her again. A desert. A diner. A pretty waitress in a sky blue uniform. When he’d seen the picture on his TARDIS door, for a moment, he wondered...but then the neuroblock must’ve kicked into higher gear and erased any sense of similarity from his mind. And he hadn’t, in truth, thought about that diner, except to wonder how the diner he had visited with Amy and Rory and River so long ago had materialized in the middle of nowhere. Now he could have smacked himself for not realizing that it was her all along.

“Merry Christmas, Doctor,” she says, that small, sad smile sliding across her lips. That smile, how could he forget that smile?

“Clara,” he says, and that word fully breaks the dam blocking his memories of her.

It all comes back in a rush. The leaf, blowing in the wind, that had brought her parents together, and her mother, with her book of _1001 Places to See_ , dying before she could see even half of them, having to entrust the book to her daughter; and her daughter clutching that book to her chest when she first came into the TARDIS after accepting his invitation to travel--but no, that wasn’t the first time, the first time she was a barmaid/governess in Victorian London and she’d found him sulking on that cloud, the cloud she’d eventually fall from, slipping through his fingers like she always seemed to, and when she’d entered the TARDIS, she’d said it was smaller on the outside. But even before that, there was Oswin Oswald who had her face and her voice but who he was far, far too late to save, but even still she had told him to run and remember her. So how could he have forgotten? Clara Oswald, who used to only travel with him on Wednesdays, hiding him like a bad habit, like chewing her fingernails, travelling to all the places her mother couldn’t see and beyond. Clara Oswald, who stepped into his timestream to save him, who’d begged the Time Lords for one more regeneration cycle, who’d almost pulled apart time just to save him from dying.

And he’d done the same. He’d fought for four and a half billion years for her. His knees almost buckle with the sheer weight of memory and time and feeling slamming into him.

“Hello, you stupid old man.” Those eyes, big and small at the same time, and the deepest brown in the world. The very first thing he had ever seen with his own eyes.

“You’re back,” he says in disbelief. “You’re in my head. All my memories are back.”

“And don’t go forgetting me again, because, frankly, that was offensive.”

_I don’t think I could ever forget you._ She’d told him that, as the neuroblock was starting. He wants to tell her that too, but he can’t quite get the words out. And anyway, it would be a lie, wouldn’t it?

He reserves one corner of his mind to processing what has just happened. Rule one of dying: die slowly. Die slowly enough that he can do the two things he most wants to do. First, and most importantly, he wants to send her a message, something to let her know, even in the most subtle way, that their life together doesn’t just exist in her head anymore. But he also knows it can’t be too overt. Just seeing her face, cobbled together from all her memories, made him want _her_ , the real her, the flesh-and-blood her, that he could reach out and touch, even hold. And he knew he couldn’t go down that road again, couldn’t do that to himself or to her. And yet, and still, she had to know.

Second, he wants to remember fully what she told him in the Cloisters, before he is just a memory too. She was the first face this face saw. It’s only right that she’s the last, even if it’s just in his memories.

So, a message. He can’t cross into their timelines to leave it. He assumes she has a TARDIS--that diner must’ve been what the Chameleon Circuit spat out--and she didn’t go back to Gallifrey immediately. After all, they were two sides of the same coin, and he had always run away from that place. But to where, and when? Would she chance going back to Earth, to her home? _Well,_ he tells himself, _I’ll have to chance it too. The universe is too big a place to go making wild guesses. And the universe owes me this._

He sets his coordinates: 21st century, Earth, London. He lays his hand against the TARDIS’s control pad, willing her to know exactly where to take him. She obliges, landing at the cemetery. He wills himself to keep the regeneration energy to a minimum, steps out, spots the gravestone he wants. ELLIE OSWALD, BELOVED DAUGHTER AND MOTHER. He reaches into his unfathomable pockets, pulls out a sheet of paper, and then, with a little further reaching, a pen. He kneels, using the gravestone as a makeshift desk, and writes, his hand shaking-- _Run, you clever girl, and be brave._ A nearby stone provides a paperweight. He props them both against the gravestone, not obtrusive enough to be called vandalizing, but clear enough to grab attention. He just has to hope she will. It’s not something he relishes, the lack of control, but he can’t dwell on it. 

He retreats to the TARDIS, to live one last memory. He reaches back into his memories, new and old at the same time, and finds the one of them in the Cloisters. The full weight of the four and a half billion years settles ever deeper into his bones, already electric with regeneration pain. But he can ignore it, because she’s telling him the most important thing he’s ever heard.

_Okay, listen. I have something I need to say._

But he couldn’t dwell on what she had to say, not when every part of his mind was working furiously on how to save her. _We do not have time._

She grabbed his arm, forced him to look at her. _No, my time...my time is up. Doctor, between one heartbeat and the last is all the time I have. People like me and you, we should say things to one another. And I’m going to say them now._ She took a deep breath. _I know it’s always been unspoken between us. Even on Trap Street, we couldn’t quite get it out. But if this is my second chance, to tell you properly, I’m taking it. I love you. I know I said I would never say those words again, but I think Danny knew, maybe even before I could admit it to myself. I love you, and I always will. I don’t even need to hear you say it back, because four and a half billion years_ \--at this, the sad, small smile-- _is proof enough._ Tears began to fall. He let himself, without even fully realizing it, cup her cheek. She leaned into it. _And if we do get away from all of this, I’ll spend the next four and a half billion years proving it back to you._

He found the strength to speak then. _Clara, you don’t need to prove anything to me. You have saved me in every life._ A lump rose in his throat. _That’s more than I can say. I don’t always save you._

_Doctor…_ She leaned forward so that their foreheads touched. Even without a heartbeat, he could feel everything, every part of her, pulsing outwards.

He had loved many, many times over. But there were those who stand out above all others, who he loved in every sense of the word, a love that almost hurt with its ferocity. The Master and Missy. Rose Tyler. River Song. And, why deny it any longer, Clara Oswald. _I love you._ He wasn’t sure if he said it or just thought it, but the pressure of her hand against his cheek and her shaky intake of breath was enough of an answer.

How long they stayed that way, he wasn’t entirely sure, even with his typically unfailing perception of time. He just knew for certain that it wasn’t long enough, because it could never be long enough. 

They pulled apart almost at the same time, Clara wiping her tears away. With that same sad smile, she said, _So, what’s the plan?_

_Same old, same old. Steal a TARDIS, run away._

_Not to put a damper on your mood, but I think they might notice you doing that._

_They never noticed the first time._ She laughed, and he had to resist pulling her towards him again. He contented himself with smiling at her and seeing her smile in return.

_I helped you that first time around, I can help you again. I’ll distract them. Are you almost ready?_

_Yes, but Clara, you have to be careful. Time Lords don’t forget easily, they’re probably still stinging from the first time ‘round._

_Just worry about getting the TARDIS. I’ll handle everything else._ At his worried expression, she rolled her eyes, still smiling. _Don’t worry, Doctor. They’ll all be looking at me._

_Well, how could they not?_

He pulls himself out of the memory with the sound of her laughter ringing in his ears, back to the pain singing in every cell in his body, desperate to rewrite every aspect of him yet again. Still a thousand and one thoughts rush through his mind--if she would find the message, if she would understand. But little by little, he lets go, gives in to the blinding, stinging light of regeneration. What will be, will be; no matter what, he has her again. The thought carries him away.

*****

Every so often, Clara gets into what Ashildr calls her “maudlin moods”. It’s when she starts to consider the merits of going to Gallifrey and letting it all end. Usually it means traveling somewhere meaningful, a last hurrah of sorts, but she’s never been very good at those, because it always ends up spurring her on further.

This time, though, she thinks, it really is the last. Because it’s not a planet that needs saving, or an era that needs seeing, or a memory that dredges up two or three or a thousand more that she wants to revisit too. It’s a gravesite, because if she has to say goodbye, she should say goodbye to the woman who started it all.

“I think I need to do this alone,” Clara says to Ashildr as they land. Ashildr raises an eyebrow at her.

“I didn’t offer to come,” she replies.

“Well,” Clara says with a shrug. “Just to make sure you knew.”

“What I know, above all else,” Ashildr says, “is that, however much you insist, this won’t be it. We’ve spent enough time together, Clara, I know you. You’re not ready to stop.”

“I will be the judge of that.” She opens the door, leaving Ashildr to roll her eyes behind her. Stepping out, breathing in the air, even though she doesn’t need to, she wonders if Ashildr is right. Every time she steps outside the TARDIS is like the first time. It somehow never gets old, the thrill of landing and seeing what you’ve found.

Mulling it over, she picks her way to her mother’s headstone. ELLIE OSWALD, BELOVED DAUGHTER AND MOTHER. She kneels. “Well,” she says, trying not to feel foolish. “1001 Places to See. I think I saw them all, mum. And even a few more besides. If you’re out there somewhere--,” and she shakes her head as if to shake aside Missy’s parody of the afterlife, “--I hope you could see it all through me. And I hope I made you proud.” She moves forward, pressing her forehead against the gray coldness. As she does, she sees a spot of white at the corner of the gravestone. She reaches for it. It’s a piece of paper held in place with a little smooth stone. For one wild moment, she wonders absurdly if her mother has sent her some note, if maybe there is an afterlife and they can send letters from there--no, she shakes that away too, half-smiling at the thought. She has seen many impossible things, but that would be a bridge too far.

She thinks the paper must’ve been here for some time. There’s writing on it, but it’s faded. She squints, raises it closer to her eyes. She starts to make out the words, written in a shaky but elegant script. _Run...you clever girl...and be brave._

If she still had a pulse, it would’ve stopped. Tears well up, spill over and nearly hit the paper; she has to crush it into her pocket so she won’t wipe the words away. Her hands cover her mouth and she lets out the first sob. _Run, you clever girl, and be brave._ She can even hear him saying it in his Scottish brogue, the words rumbling somewhere deep inside her. _Run, you clever girl, and be brave._ Those words, in a loop in her head. Somehow, this was less expected than a message from her dead mother, and that makes her laugh through the tears. Sad smiles, he always remarked on her sad smiles, said he could never understand them, said he didn’t know how he caused them. “You stupid old man,” she whispers into her palms. “You stupid, daft, impossible man.”

She sits there, her back pressed against the gravestone, letting herself wonder about when he came here. When had he remembered, and how? And did that mean the Time Lords were coming for her, to close the loop that had just been reopened? Or did it mean she could see him again?

“No.” She says it out loud, so she can really hear it. No, because whenever they’re around each other, they break all the rules. _Don’t enter another person’s timestream, especially not a Time Lord’s. Don’t beg for another regeneration cycle. Don’t throw the keys of a TARDIS into a volcano. Don’t forgive someone for doing just that. Don’t create a bootstrap paradox. Don’t spend four and a half billion years to fulfill a duty of care. Don’t try to run away. Don’t remember._

Those last ones are the only ones she can afford to keep breaking. There are more people in this universe than just the two of them, and if they come together again, they’ll just keep smashing it until it breaks like a thick wall of diamond. But to run, to remember, to be brave...maybe if she does that, he’ll notice, the way she noticed the note. Maybe little winks to each other across time and space can be enough.

She stands, her muscles stiff from the cold. She feels in her pocket for the note. It’s there, a point of contact between them. She walks back to the TARDIS--they’ve managed to make it change to a red London phone box when they land somewhere, although it always reverts to the diner sooner or later--and pushes the door open. Ashildr sticks her head into the control room from the hallway. “Tell me,” she says, “do I end this diary entry with ‘Clara made good on her promise,’ or ‘Clara lied again’?”

“Oh shut up,” Clara says good-naturedly.

“Good answer,” Ashildr snarks back, and disappears into the hallway. After a minute, she returns, diary in hand.

“See, I tell you all the time, you care about me,” Clara says, beginning to fiddle with the controls.

“Correction: I would be bored without you,” Ashildr says, but it lacks any bite and her smile is genuine. “So, what was it this time?”

Clara shrugs. Probably it’ll come out at some point; big as a TARDIS is, there still isn’t enough room for too many secrets. But right now, she wants to keep the note to herself. She wants the knowledge to stay between him and her. “That brisk English air. It’s very reinvigorating, you should try it.”

Ashildr laughs and leans against the control board. “Where to, then, with all your vigor?”

Clara grasps the liftoff lever in one hand and the note in the other. “Where else?” she says, pulling down. “Somewhere awesome.”

**Author's Note:**

> I didn’t include Twelve’s great ending monologue, but if you choose, you can imagine him saying it after he reenters the TARDIS at the gravesite. It’s just that a portion of his mind is thinking about the Cloisters, just like a portion of his mind is in the TARDIS figuring things out in “Heaven Sent”. Thank you for reading!


End file.
